We had a flutter of snow yesterday and today, but this weekend there should be some nice spring weather. Traci and I have some ambitious plans for Sunday. We're going to head into the San Rafael Swell and find at least 14 geocaches. There's also a place that I'd like to stop and look for some dinosaur trackways near Horn Silver Gulch. I know from this abstract that there are some dinosaur tracks in the Summerville Formation near there, and according to Google's cached text it's on state land. That narrows it down to one square mile at most, but according to the geologic map of that area, the Summerville Formation only takes up about half of the state land in that area. If I further narrow it down to places near the existing roads, I think I could easily find some dinosaur tracks.

In two more weeks, the boys and I are going camping (probably near the dinosaur quarry) while Traci goes up north for her annual trek to the scrapbook expo. That camping trip will mostly be to make sure everything in the trailer still works after the repairs I made and from sitting unused all winter. The week after that is the big San Rafael geocaching campout near Temple Mountain. That should be a lot of fun because I've never been to that area, and I've got three days off work plus Saturday and Sunday to hang out there. For a couple of those days it will be just Bradley and me there because Traci works and Michael has school. I don't yet know what I'm going to do there for such a long time, but there's plenty of hiking around the San Rafael Reef so I'm sure I can keep busy.

I've been dealing with a broken tailgate handle on my truck for many months, all because the Ford dealer wanted $45 for a new one. I would have gotten one from a junkyard, but there aren't really any down here and I haven't traveled up north for a long time. It finally occurred to me last week that I could probably get a non-OEM handle somewhere online, and duh!, I found one for $13. So, it arrived today and I installed it pretty easily. I had to do some modifications to the tailgate because it's bent pretty badly (looks like somebody dropped an engine block on it), and I also bought a new set of sockets and wrenches because I needed a 10mm deep socket to finish installing the handle, and I still came in under the $45 that the dealer wanted for just the handle!

Yesterday afternoon, Traci, the kids, and I planted enough seeds for 46 plants for our vegetable garden. The kids got to choose a couple of plants that they wanted to grow, and they'll go in large pots in the back yard so that they can water them (though I'm sure I'll end up taking care of them instead). Each year for the past few years, we've at least attempted planting a garden. The first year was a complete failure--the weeds were too much for us to keep up with, or at least more effort than we wanted to expend. After that, we just did some tomatoes near the back of the house, and though we put too many plants into a really small area, we had more tomatoes than we knew what to do with. Last year, we had some success with tomatoes, corn, cucumbers, and watermelon in the garden, but several other plants didn't make it. This year, I'm hoping we're not too lazy to keep up with the weeds and pests and all the other hazards of keeping a garden.

I fixed the plumbing on my trailer this weekend. What I thought was going to be a tough job ended up taking 20 minutes and cost only $15. Now I'm ready to do some camping! Unfortunately, I've got a lot of projects that I need to do over the next several weeks while the weather is relatively mild. I've dug out the irrigation ditch in my back yard and plan on pouring concrete there in a few days. Traci and I have been talking about planting a garden again this year, but it's easy to talk about it right up until the point where you actually have to start it, and then it's easy to just shrug it off and never even start it. I'm still not sure if we're actually going to do a garden, but it would be nice. I think I've mentioned my garage roof way too many times here--it still needs to be replaced. The sprinkler system in the front yard still needs replacing. My bathroom floor still needs replacing. The kitchen sink needs a new faucet. Oh, who needs a nice house when you'd rather be out enjoying the outdoors anyway? :)

Google Earth recently updated their aerial images of my area, and now I find myself spending (wasting) way too much time panning and zooming around. I no longer have to actually be there to explore an area. The new color photos are much better than the USGS black and white photos that used to be the best for this area. Actually, the stuff they had in Google Earth before last week was absolutely worthless--it was in color, but the resolution was so poor that you could barely make out entire canyons, let alone major roads. Now you can see foot trails that weren't visible in the 10-year-old USGS imagery.

Just today, I discovered some interesting features on Flickr. I've had an account there for a long time, but never uploaded any photos because I could just as easily store them on this site. Then I realized that you can specify exactly where each of your photos was taken, and they can be displayed on a map. From there, it's really easy to view other peoples' photos that were taken at or near the same locations. There was one group specifically for photos taken along Skyline Drive and Huntington-Eccles Scenic Byway, and since I had a lot of photos for that area, I joined and uploaded a bunch. I'm sure there are a lot of groups there that I would fit right in with, so I'll probably be posting more photos there in the future.

I'm recovering well from yesterday's hike to Sid's Mountain. I'm really not all that sore, and certainly not as sore as I was after my lame 8.6 mile hike a month ago. I've uploaded a lot of pictures here. Eight people in all were along for the hike. We began the hike at 7:30 in the morning and didn't arrive back at the trailhead until about 6:00 pm. Round trip was 14.2 miles, which is by far the longest hike I've ever done. Here is my GPS trip data:

Not only was this the longest hike I've been on, but it was also the most remote area I've ever been in. Despite that, there was an old cowboy cabin up on top that was built in the 1940s that was quite interesting, and lots of other signs of modern human use. Not as obvious, but still noticeable if you look closely, are a lot of signs of Fremont Indian use from more than 1,000 years ago.

We began the hike by snaking our way down a steep hillside into North Salt Wash. The water in the bottom was frozen, but shallow enough that when it was flowing on our way back in the evening, it would still be crossable without getting wet. After crossing the bottom of the wash, we hiked up a half-mile long ridge that gained about 600 feet in elevation over its length. It was a much gentler slope than we'd descended on the other side of the canyon, but it was our first taste of exertion for the morning. After reaching the top of the ridge, we were on the plateau which is called Sid's Mountain. It's not really a mountain at all, but a large, flat plateau that's surrounded by deep canyons on all sides.

From that point at the top of the ridge, we hiked another 3/4-mile on relatively flat ground until we reached a well-worn horse trail. We followed the horse trail most of the rest of the day. We went to the old cabin and found the geocache there, then pressed on and hiked up a 250-foot high sandstone knoll to another geocache. Inside the geocache somebody had left the coordinates to some petroglyphs, so we took a detour to look at them.

On our way back to the trailhead, instead of hiking down the ridge we'd come up, we followed the horse trail back down into North Salt Wash. A few people who still had some energy left (myself not included) split off from the group and visited some more petroglyphs in canyon bottom, but we all met up again near the bottom of the steep climb back up to our vehicles. We got back to the top just as the sun was setting, and it had fully set before we finished our goodbyes and drove away. As we were bumping along the dirt road back to civilization, the full moon was rising in the east.

I was beat by the time I got home, and I started feeling sick a couple of hours after that. I'm not sure if it was from exhaustion or something else, but today I'm feeling great. I'm already scheming to make another trip to Sid's Mountain, probably an overnighter later this year after it warms up a bit more. There's a lot up there to explore, and relatively few people have or ever will go there.

I should've taken tomorrow off work. I had planned on spending this evening getting my gear ready for the big hike on Saturday, but I ended up spending a couple of hours designing a logo for the preschool that Traci is starting. I'm not totally enthused about her starting a business, considering the failure rate of most small businesses around here, but she is confident that it'll work. And, since her dad is putting up all the startup money, I can't complain too much.

Anyhow, I won't have much time after work tomorrow to finish getting stuff ready. We're leaving Price at 5:15 on Saturday morning, so I've got to hit the sack pretty early tomorrow night. There are five people who I'm certain will be going, another four who are maybes, and four others who said they might come but probably won't show. It should be a fun convoy out into the San Rafael Swell in the dark of early morning, and it'll probably be a weary drive home at dusk. I hope I'm up for a long day of grueling fun.